After two weeks of lack of inspiration (and garage cleaning), the last three pages are underway.
The ninth page was completed during that two weeks - I was just waiting for the bee appliqués to arrive. I stitched them down and drew their little buzzy flight paths.
I am designing many of the pages to reflect the JCs^2 childhood love of The Wiggles and that has been a real challenge for me.
Modifying designs and pages that I created and drew myself for earlier quiet books has been helpful.
This dinosaur page features in several quiet books and I decided to modify it into the Wiggles dinosaur, Dorothy.
I ran into a problem right away.
Her teeth are located at the very base of her face, not midway. (I.e. it's like she has no chin or bottom jaw.)
To cover the zipper (which has to be very low on Dorothy's face), the teeth have to be large enough to hide it.
If I put the zipper too low, there will be too much stress on the smaller portion of her jaw and a big chance that the fabric might tear from little fingers pulling on that zipper.
I'm still thinking about how to solve this dilemma.
I needed a small Wiggles Jeff doll for another page.
Believe it or not, I found what I needed at a toy shop in Australia, and the cost for the doll and shipping was reasonable!
It'a actually a later iteration Wiggle, but it has a purple shirt which Jeff wears in the show. Wiggle Captain Feathersword will also be represented on this page by the ship and the feather. (Commercial feathers for hatmakers that are sterilized and sanitized first.)
For the very final page, I had a special request from Gimmee Sarah - a Caps for Sale page. She reminded me of how much JC loved that book (so do I) and so I am creating a scene where the monkeys steal the caps.
I had a made-for-school felt board story in my quiet book stash so I've pulled it out. I don't like the monkeys that came with it, so I am using some patches that were also in my stash.
The last three pages came about after making a list of the activities already in the book and their tactile abilities and checking to see if I had any skills missing. I think the quiet book is in good shape. Almost done!
There was still something else left to do - shop for the cover fabric.
My current favorite TV show is Bluey. It's gentle, it's funny, and it's charming. So when I found some Bluey fabric, Lisa and I took a closer look at it. We rated it a maybe. ("Rita! This is on sale for only three hundred dollarbucks!")
More Bluey fabric! In, well, blue! Another maybe. (::growl:: "What?? Janet, one hundred dollarbucks is too much. Argh!!")
This sage green llama fabric was flannel, which would add to the tactile aspect of the quiet book. And yes; we bought a yard.
Mama Jaycie wants to own a farm some day, fill it with animals, and do animal therapy for veterans and others. Not a tactile fabric, but another yes. This fabric could be used to teach about animals, the sounds they make (which would not be very quiet but still!), colors, and more.
As we shopped, Lisa and I came around a corner and ran into a face that looked familiar and took me a moment to figure out who I was seeing.
Former student Lacie from my very last class of teaching!
Lacie and me on her first day of 4th grade. She'd brought me a vase of cut flowers from her own garden and we took a picture together.
It was lovely to see her, catch up a bit (she's going to Purdue in Elementary Education!), and to hear about her brother Trey, who I'd also taught, and his plans as well as his upcoming wedding.
Off to go work on the quiet book. Family starts arriving in eight days so I am working every moment I can grab.
Stay 'tooned!
